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The holidays were fast approaching. The church secretary opened her email at the beginning of her day and noticed an email from a shipping company from which she was expecting a package. She asked the pastor if he thought she should open it, and he agreed it was safe. Wrong move. Instead of a shipping notification, the email deployed malware that contained ransomeware. Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident. In the first 6 months of 2021, there was $590 million of “ransomeware-related activity” according to the U.S. Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).

US Treasury Financial and Enforcement Network . That doesn’t count the amount that went unreported, as only businesses considered critical to the nation’s infrastructure are required to do so. And of course it doesn’t count losses experienced by the rest of the world, as the US is not the only country so victimized.

So what should the hapless church employees have done instead?

1) Look closely at the email address. I recently got a spam purportedly from UPS. It’s ridiculously easy to forge a from: header, so the first thing I always do is look at the email address. It was from:
ciaowp@rfikjgfoprhro.co.com
Uh, yeah–that doesn’t look anything remotely like UPS to me. The terrible grammar just confirmed that:
“Hello Dear,
You are Customer #688342 of USPS Rewards and we have been waiting for your confirmation. Since this delivery is for FNAME
To activate the delivery, please confirm here
Best regards,
USPS Rewards”

If all these emails were that unsophisticated, phishing likely wouldn’t be the problem that it is today, but unfortunately, there are those out there that can appear very very convincing.

2) Don’t click a link in an email. Go to the website of the company–UPS, for example–and enter your tracking number there.

It also goes without saying–except, evidently, it doesn’t–that if you’re checking your personal email on the job, the prohibition against clicking a link holds double, as you could be causing damage to your employer’s systems and network. It’s best to just check it from your phone.

Holiday scams take advantage of the fact that people are rushed and aren’t paying as close attention as they probably should be. Don’t fall victim.

Be smart, be wise
Always verifies.
&
Stop and think
Before you click that link.
And then say “screw it!”
Just don’t do it!

Shipping Scam Story

Shipping Scam Story

Mary Garcia had very mixed feelings about Christmas now that she was an adult. Presents to buy, wrap, and ship, parties to host, decorations to unpack and assemble, pageants to rehearse for and attend, Christmas dinner and pot luck items to prepare. That didn’t even include her responsibilities as a church secretary–an extra service, far more bulletins to print than usual, the annual Christmas dinner, and on it went. She was always glad when it was over. Now, though, she was simply feeling harried.

She pulled into the church office 5min late because she’d gotten stuck in a long line at the post office. She was relieved to see Pastor Bill pulling in at the same time.

“Guess you can’t yell at me if you’re late, too,” Mary quipped.

“I can’t believe the lines at the post office are this long at 8 in the morning?” the pastor replied.

“All the snowbirds fleeing their homes but shipping shiploads of stuff back there. They can’t even stay off the roads long enough for the locals to get to work on time,” Mary complained.

“Got that right!” the pastor agreed. “At least it kinda feels like Christmas–or at least more than it did a week ago when it was 80.”

“Well, if a high of 70 degrees feels like Christmas to you, knock yourself out, Pastor.” The 2 laughed as they walked inside. “I’ll start the coffee.”

Soon the smell of coffee was wafting down the hall. Ten minutes later, both secretary and pastor were filling their cups.

“Always smells so much better than it tastes,” pastor Bill remarked.

“It’s church coffee. What do you expect with this old hunk of junk?”

The pastor shrugged and went down the hall to his office.

The intercom rang shortly afterwords.

“Yes?”

“I opened up my home email here at the office. USPS says there’s a problem with my package. Do you think it’s ok for me to open the email now?”

There was a pause. “Sounds innocent enough. I don’t see why not.”

Mary’s screen froze. Awhile later, the following note was displayed:
“Attention!

All your files, documents, photos, databases and other important files are encrypted and have the extension: .KRAB

The only method of recovering files is to purchase an unique private key. Only we can give you this key and only we can recover your files.

The server with your key is in a closed TOR network. You can get there by the following ways:

0. Download Tor browser – https://www.torproject.org/

| 1. Install Tor browser
| 2. Open Tor Browser
| 3. Open link in TOR browser: http://gandcrabmfe6mnef.onion/[snip]
| 4. Follow the instructions on this page

On our page you will see instructions on payment and get the opportunity to decrypt 1 file for free.

ATTENTION!

IN ORDER TO PREVENT DATA DAMAGE:

• DO NOT MODIFY ENCRYPTED FILES
• DO NOT CHANGE DATA BELOW

—BEGIN GANDCRAB KEY—
[snip]
—END GANDCRAB KEY—

—BEGIN PC DATA—
[snip]
—END PC DATA—“

     "We simply can't afford $5000," Pastor Bill said once he'd read the ransom demand. "We'll simply have to reconstruct a year's worth of records from paper. I'll help as much as I can, but..."

Mary sighed. “Yeah, I know, you’ve got extra stuff to do. I guess there goes our Christmas break.”

“Fraid so, and the kids are gonna be furious with me cuz Disneyland is now off the table. Merry Christmas to all.”